Shaking Off The Rust

I'd like to say that I've spent the last 3 and a half months gallantly travelling around the world, meeting flamboyant people and experiencing memorable adventures, which is why I haven't been able to post anything since the beginning of July. Proudly declaring that I made some radical career decisions and have embarked on my career of choice - an unconventional, risky path that everyone advised me against - would have had a nice ring to it too. Heck, I'd even settle for having had the opportunity to say that I've finally started - and finished - writing the book that I've long been dreaming of writing, and am now anxiously hunting for a publisher bold enough to let my work of art go to print. To now say that I've not even come close to doing any of these things sounds so depressing that I'm already starting to regret writing this post. And precisely as I finish typing this astonishingly sorrowful sentence, a bunch of really really loud Diwali firecrackers go off in the distance, almost making me jump from my chair. 'Ironical' doesn't even begin to describe it.

3 and a half months is a really long time. And yet, all I've been able to do in that really long period is continue with my same boring old routine which goes something like this - work, get tired, eat, remain tired, sleep, remain tired, and work again. Oh, somewhere in the midst of this routine I have had the time to develop and solidify a deep hatred for my job, watch a few movies, wonder why Ernests Gulbis, the 20-year-old tennis player from with Latvia with THE talent keeps getting the worst draws imaginable in the big tournaments (I mean come on - Nadal in the Wimbledon second round, Roddick in the US Open second round and Nadal AGAIN in the Madrid Masters second round? You've got to be kidding me.) and muse indifferently at how weird it is that the global economy, and consequently the entire world and all of its people, really, depend on such few unpredictable, unreliable, lottery-like and completely manipulable elements like stock markets and real estate markets. I'd also like to have been able to say that I spent some time during my hiatus trying to find ways to shorten my sentences in my blog posts, but then, wouldn't that be too obvious a lie?

I hate my work. Period. It's so easy to say something like that. I don't know when exactly this hatred started, but I can assure you that it is in its full bloom right now. Of course, the fact that my current assignment requires me to travel on my bike for 60 km everyday (sometimes in the midst of pouring rain, and frequently through mind-numbingly frustrating traffic jams) contributes a great deal to that loathing. But I've come to the realization that I'd probably hate anything that I have to do, whether it's for earning money or for getting a degree. I can enjoy doing something, anything, only as long as I do it of my own free discretion. Heck, I'd probably start hating Harry Potter if I had it as a subject of my course material. I don't know why this is so; I don't even know whether everyone else is destined to suffer this awful fate or I'm the only woebegone one. Deep thoughts these - I think I need PLENTY of leisure time to adequately reflect on them.

Watched a fair few movies the past few months. I was completely bedazzled, enthralled and awed by the phenomenon that was The Dark Knight, both in my first viewing AND my second one, possibly even more in the second one. It makes me feel so good that I had declared Chris Nolan my favourite Hollywood director to anyone who'd listen more than a year before everyone else watched The Dark Knght and started jumping on the Nolan bandwagon. Rock On!! was good, but I really wasn't as impressed by it as most people seem to be (I know I'm nit-picking, but just why couldn't the director have asked Arjun Rampal to at least make an effort to look like he was actually playing the guitar?). Kidnap was tremendously funny; I simply cannot get Imran Khan's priceless expressions out of my head, specially the one when he mouths "Main tumhara kal, aur tumhar kal hoon" in a supposedly sinister voice. And they said the kid was a promising actor. I missed out on all those meaningful flicks like Mumbai Meir Jaan, A Wednesday, even Body Of Lies, but frankly, I think I'm a little tired of the terrorist theme being played out in nearly every single movie being released these days. The movie that I truly, truly regret missing out on is Wall-E; I have no idea when the movie was released in India, let alone when it was pulled out of theatres. Now I have no option but to wait for the DVD release, which is going to be sometime next month. I can't believe I watch all the piece of trash movies in the world but pass over the only animated movie in the past 20 years that is being talked up for a Best Picture nomination at the Oscars. I cannot believe this.

In other news, it has been confirmed that Jelena Jankovic is going to end the year as the world's No.1 tennis player, as is Rafael Nadal on the men's side, but for once, the women are causing a greater stir than the men among tennis fans. Jankovic, as has been widely asserted, has never triumphed at a Grand Slam, has only been in a Grand Slam final once (this year at the US Open) and has played the most matches on tour this year, losing as many as 17 matches. Serena Williams, on the other hand, won this year's US Open (and has won 8 other Slams overall), was part of a breathtaking Wimbledon final against her sister Venus, and lost just 7 matches throughout the year. I'm sorry, but in my opinion it simply doesn't make sense that Jankovic will end the year No.1 while Serena will be languishing at No.3. Jankovic does care about rankings a lot more than Serena, I'll give her that; but how fair is a ranking system that allows a player to play a bunch of tournaments towards the end of the year (incidentally, the 'end of the year' period in tennis is the period when most of the big guns have trouble gathering up enough motivation and energy to get through their matches with their reputations intact) and usurp the top ranking from a player who has just re-affirmed that she is the only player on tour who can blow away the competition (unless that competition is her sister) when fully fit and healthy? Someone should be asking this question to the WTA bigwigs.

I took so long to write this post that the fireworks, which at one point seemed capable of blowing a hole through my wall, have now been reduced to an occasional bang here and a half-hearted thud there. I guess that's a sign for me to wrap things up. This looks like one of my worst blog posts ever. But it's alright. I'm rusty. I won't think of it now. Tomorrow is a new day. God, I need to end this before it gets any cornier.

When A Treat Is Not A Treat, But Is A Double Treat!

Trust A R Rahman to pull a fast one on us when least expected. For the past 3 years we’ve been fed on crumbs, literally – there have been a measly 3 albums (Rang De Basanti, Guru and Jodhaa Akbar) composed by the musical genius since 2006 and we’ve been forced to sportingly take that lying down. And now out of the blue, two A R Rahman albums releasing one day apart! Talk about a double treat. And even though I know that as a die-hard A R Rahman fan I should be ashamed for not having had a shadow of an inkling that Rahman had been preparing to cut his own album for the past 6 months or so, there’s a certain special charm to pleasant surprises like these. It kind of makes me wish I hadn’t spent the 6 months before the release of the 7^th Harry Potter book obsessing about the million or so theories concerning anything and everything about Potterverse.

Right then, so the big question, of course, is – how good are the two new A R Rahman albums – Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na and Ada? I’ll start with Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na, or JTYJN for short (I really did think Aamir Khan, of all people, wouldn’t find the need to have the title of his movie sound like the first half of the script). The movie is supposed to be a youthful romance, and Rahman, as always, makes sure that every track in the album perfectly fits the theme of the movie. The first track, Kabhi Kabhi Aditi Zindagi is - there’s no other word for it – vintage A R Rahman. In other words, a very very good composition. Jaane Tu Mera Kya Hai is somewhat a middling track – a little weird on melody, and the kind of song you don’t really know whether to like or not. Nazrein Milaana almost sounds like Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy territory, and I think I should add here that Rahman does a better Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy than anyone else, maybe even better than the trio themselves. I normally hate to use this word, but the track is wonderfully - peppy. So much for the perennial classical inclinations of the maestro.

Pappu Can’t Dance is, plain and simple, disappointing. If there has been one grouse I have held against Rahman these past few years, other than his tendency to occasionally disappear from the music scene for months together, is that he seems to have lost his touch when it comes to dance numbers. Which was the last really rocking dance number you heard from him? Masti Ki Pathshala from Rang De Basanti? When I heard that song for the first time, I had a hard time getting past the fact that the song actually had no tune to speak of. Personally, I thought the Meherbaan track from Tehzeeb was great, but even that was nearly 5 years ago. I don’t know about you, but I really miss the days of Rangeela Re and Humma Humma. But we must make do with what we have, and what we have is still quietly and impressively enthralling. Kahin To Hogi almost sounds like a Westlife/Boyzone track with Hindi lyrics, and it does its job well. And can we ever have a Rahman album without a single track that strays dramatically from the beaten Bollywood path? Tu Bole Main Boloon is laden with heavy jazz and funk elements, and while I’m sure it’d suit the context of the movie well, I can’t really say that I enjoyed the track.

Ok, enough of film talk. Let’s talk about Rahman’s own privately recorded album Ada now. The thing that struck me the moment I started listening to the tracks of the album is how unnatural Rahman’s songs sound when sung by typically dulcet singers like Sonu Nigam and Alka Yagnik. Maybe I don’t notice that in Rahman’s Bollywood albums, but then again, how often does he sign up the typical Bollywood singers anyway? I personally can’t get enough of Rahman’s own vocals – there’s something very endearing about the way he completely disregards the lyrics of the song (he still can’t speak Hindi, even after all these years) and gets lost, almost like a child, in the rhythm and melody of the track. As it turns out, however, there’s just one song sung by him in the album, and that put me off in a big way. Ada is a very nice album, no doubt, but I somehow get the feeling that Rahman is playing it safe with this album – almost too many mass-appealing numbers. Gulfisha is a fantastic track, but what on earth is Gumsum all about? For a second there I almost felt like looking it up on the internet and making sure that it was actually Rahman who’d composed the track and not some blissfully stagnant Nadeem-Shravan or Sajid-Wajid type of music director, what with the Madanpura-style beats and all. Hawa Sun Hawa restored some of my faith in Rahman, and Meherbaan almost made me feel guilty of my earlier disparaging thoughts about him, but Ishq Ada again goes on a tailspin, taking ‘weird melody’ to another level. Hai Dard and Milo Wahan are a little too ordinary for my liking, but Tu Mera Hai is again an impressive piece. I suppose by now I should’ve gotten used to the wild fluctuations in quality that have been the norm with any Rahman album ever since I can remember, but it always comes as a surprise to me that genius must necessarily have its low moments to inspire and propagate its incredible highs.

I think I’m going a little overboard with the whole ‘Rahman and genius’ thing. But you know what, when compared with the run-of-the-mill plagiarists that make up the majority of Bollywood’s musical talent, ‘genius’ might actually be a bit of an understatement. It’s not everyday, after all, that a Taal or a Dil Se is created. To be honest, however, the Rahman magic seems to be waning a little these days – perhaps he needs to take himself a little less seriously? He’s become the mascot, so to speak, of international music, and it just seems to me that he’s become a little too conscious about making sure that his music reflects the global appeal of his work. I think he needs to let go of all the baggage that comes with being a larger-than-life icon and concentrate, instead, on making uncomplicated, beautiful music, the kind of music he made for Roja and Rangeela, the kind of music that made us fall in love with his astonishing – I’m sorry, but there’s no other word for it – genius. No, I have not over-used that word. Some people just deserve to be exaggerated about.

The Different Forms Of Art

There is something to be said about playing to the gallery with such pinpoint precision that the very act, provincial and classless as it may seem on the surface, is elevated to an art. The makers of Iron Man 'play to the gallery' with such remarkable intensity that it's hard to imagine anyone not thoroughly enjoying the movie. The loud bangs and vivid scenes of mindless flinging and flying of heavy objects are all in place, as are the mandatory romantic subplot and crisp humorous lines by the protagonist. Just about every cheap mass-appealing cinematic technique is thrown in, but no one's complaining, because all of it works so perfectly. It helps, of course, that the film is laden with some of the most magnificent cinematography and special effects ever seen, and that Robert Downey Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow have no shortage of that thing called screen presence. No, this movie won't be thought about in connection with the year's Oscar hopefuls, not even as a joke, but I can tell you one thing: you'll have a blast watching it. Which is considerably more than you can say about any potentially Oscar-winning movie. Don't get me wrong, I still think Batman Begins is the best superhero movie ever made, but sometimes it's nice to not keep looking for cinematic brilliance or aesthetic expertise or thought-provoking dialogue and instead watch a movie for pure entertainment.

Moving on to a completely different subject, I've just realized what the best thing about the game of tennis is: it allows for very little mourning time. The tennis schedule is so jam-packed with tournaments that the average tennis fan gets very little time to wallow in his miseries and bemoan the total lack of joy on earth when his favourite player or players lose, because before you know it, the next tournament, and the chance of redemption for the player in question, is already underway. And this is exactly what happened with me this week, when Roger Federer's quarterfinal loss to Radek Stepanek (?!) at the Rome Masters was followed by Novak Djokovic winning the tournament, which, trust me, is a big, big tragedy in my eyes. The Hamburg Masters actually began even before the final match between Djokovic and Stanislas Wawrinka started, so I had no option but to snap out of my depression and get back to my nervous checking of the tournament schedule and live streaming/scores and assure myself that Federer hasn't yet made an early exit at a tournament for the umpteenth time this year. Incidentally, a potential semi-final match between Rafael Nadal and Djokovic at the Hamburg Masters might just turn out to be the marquee match of the year, considering the fact that the winner of the match gets to walk away with the No. 2 rank in the ATP computer rankings. I'm nervous for Rafa already.

Just finished watching the extended, unedited versions of all the three Lord of the Rings movies (which might actually be the exact antithesis of a movie like Iron Man) for what seems like the hundredth time. And yet, the sheer magnificence and grandeur of the trilogy never ceases to amaze me. I think I've said this to nearly everyone I've ever talked to about any sort of movie, but this is the first time I'll be putting it in writing: In my opinion, the Lord of the Rings trilogy is the greatest set of movies ever made. You can have your Godfathers and Shawshank Redemptions and Gone With The Winds, but nothing comes close to the jaw-dropping spectacle created so lovingly by Peter Jackson. It's just as well that the 3 LOTR movies together picked up no less than 17 Oscar awards. Just goes to show that the Oscar jury does get it right every once in a while.

Back Without A Bang

Ok, I'll admit I can no longer stand the guilt that comes with not writing a post for over a month; I feel I can be brave enough to concede that the only reason I'm writing this is because every other blog writer I know continues to merrily write post after post without so much as a hint of a furrowed brow, while my blog has been languishing in the sorrowful shadows, unattended and ignored. Ugh, looks like the month-long hiatus has made my writing a little over-dramatic. But what the heck, as long as I'm writing something....

Perhaps the most significant development in the last one month, other than Hilary Clinton closing the gap on Barack Obama in the Democratic presidential race in the US, the previously unheard-of phenomenon of foodgrain scarcity scaring the living daylights out of Americans, Priyanka Gandhi meeting with one of the assassins responsible for her father's death, and our dear old MSEB announcing that Pune will not have to face load-shedding at least until September but deciding to subject Puneites anyway to frequent, painful power-cuts lasting anywhere between 5 seconds and 5 hours (whew, this is turning out to be one long sentence), has been the roaring success of the Indian Premier League, or IPL, to be more hep about it. Actually, 'roaring success' might be an understatement - there's something so enthralling, so rivetingly amusing about seeing those mighty Australian and South African players being meekly obedient to their Indian captains and eagerly putting in the yards to, oh, defeat just another State team filled with a bunch of second class Indian cricketers, that there never really should have been a doubt about the success of the tournament. It helps, of course, that the format of the tournament is eerily similar to that of the many football leagues in Europe that are so wildly popular with a small but substantial segment of Indian sports watchers. The IPL has done to cricket what a 100 years of Test cricket and 40 years of one-day cricket couldn't: it has made cricket, in every shallow and amateurish sense of the term, 'cool'. Way to go, BCCI!


In other news, the tennis clay season has begun, and the question that has enchanted and consumed tennis followers for the past 3 years has surfaced again: can Roger Federer beat Rafael Nadal at the French Open? Federer, for his part, seems to have overcome his early season hiccups by stringing together two consecutive finals appearances on his least favourite surface, notching up his first title of the year at Estoril before losing to Rafael Nadal in the final at Monte Carlo. Yeah, I know, nothing new or earth-shattering about that last bit - Federer losing to Nadal on clay has become somewhat of a given, has it not? What does surprise me, however, is the continued and insistent belief that Federer's supporters hold that he will, one day, manage to overcome the King of Clay at the French Open. I mean seriously, if you saw how much advice, not support, but advice that Federer gets before each match that he plays against Nadal from thousands of people who may never have wielded a racquet their whole lives , you'd think Federer was the prized protege of nearly half of the tennis-watching population of the world. Play the slice backhand. Use the forehand dropshot. Come to the net more often. Attack Nadal's second serve more aggressively. Improve your serving percentage. Some have even suggested switching over from a one-handed backhand (that gorgeous beauty of a shot) to a two-handed one. Even Jose Higueras, Federer's celebrated (?) new coach, hasn't been spared the 'expert' counsel. In the midst of all this, some rather more well-informed columnists gravely pronounce that Nadal on clay is a puzzle that cannot be solved; that Federer simply does not have the patience or fitness to get the better of the muscular Spaniard on dirt. How true is that last statement? Being a sworn Federer fan, I like to believe that it isn't in the least true; but it's all rather pointless for us to be armchair psychologists, is it not? At the end of the day Federer has to go out on the court and play solid tennis and outwit Nadal. Nothing more, nothing less. In the meantime, he can continue to delight us by displaying the kind of dazzling tennis that he put on show in his quarterfinal match against old nemesis David Nalbandian, and by handing out a few dozen more defeats to Novak Djokovic, preferably including several bagel sets. And of course, a few more moments like the "Be quiet, ok?" admonition that he shouted out to Djokovic's mother in their semi-final match at Monte Carlo. That was just so unexpected and so very wonderful. I mean, wow.


Watched a couple of Bollywood flicks last week, first Tashan, a strange movie that has all the right ideas but falls sorely short in execution. The first half is stylish and mildly interesting, the second half shoddy and exasperating. A shame, really, considering the extraordinary hype generated by the movie before its release and the oodles of hard work that must have been put in by Kareena Kapoor to achieve that thing called size zero. The other flick that I watched, U Me Aur Hum, is almost the reverse of Tashan - intolerably boring first half, mildly touching second half. Here too, the makers had a great premise, but the mandatory theatrics and Bollywood-style wooing sequences ruin things considerably. Kajol comes up with a vintage performance - even after all these years, she still holds, in my opinion, stomping rights to the mantle of being the best actress in Bollywood, and there are quite a few heart-rending scenes towards the end of the movie, but that's just about it. Just a thought: is the tagline of the movie, "Sometimes the greatest journey is the distance between two people" supposed to be a quote from an outside source, knowing as we do how the Ed Norton starrer The Painted Veil has the exact same tagline, or is this another pathetic attempt at thinly disguised plagiarism by Bollywood's dear old thieves?

Okay, for what seems like the umpteenth time, I seem to have run riot with my post - there's nothing more irritating than a post that never seems to end, is there? So I'll end right here - no conclusion, no dramatic parting line. Yes, this is it. The End. I quite like the ring of that. Hehehe.

What's That You've Got Missing? A Heart?

Ok, let me start by saying that I went in to watch Jodhaa-Akbar fully prepared to fall in love with the historical epic. Ashutosh Gowariker, after all, does have a rather splendid body of work to impress and excite people with. You don't get nominated for an Oscar for nothing. And the premise this time seemed so perfectly grandiose - a sweeping love story set in the royally magnificent days of Mughal Shehenshahs and phrases like "Takh Liya!" - what more could one ask for? Everything seemed so right about this movie that, much as in the case of Sanjay Bhansali's Black, people were talking about the Oscar prospects of the movie months before its release. Sadly, they spoke too soon.

I can't really give the exact reason why the movie failed to impress me. The plot construction and character development are more than adequate, the acting is top-notch and the painstaking attention to detail evident throughout the movie is truly commendable. I guess it's just one of those movies which you can brush off with a comment like, "but it had no soul!". And as snobbish as that sounds, I think it's spot on. Gowariker seems to have got a little lost amid all the splendor and the fancy Urdu. The cornerstone of the movie, the fundamentally vulnerable bond between Emperor Akbar and the Rajput princess Jodhaa simply doesn't create an impact as strong as one would have expected in a larger-than-life saga such as this. As contradictory as this may sound, Gowariker had an excellent premise to cut his teeth into, but not enough meat in the central plot to chew on. A cinematic head-scratcher, I'm sure, that not many filmmakers have to deal with.

Historically speaking the movie seems well-researched (for a wikipedia-educated person anyway), though it is certainly questionable whether Akbar would have spent so much time and energy wooing the politically-bonded Jodhaa when he reportedly had over a 100 wives to worry about. The military conquests and political travails of Akbar are intricately woven into the plot in an efficient enough way so that no sub-plot seems out of place or unnecessary. When I say 'sub-plots', of course, I don't include the overly long-drawn sequences of grief and melodrama suffered by just about everyone in the movie, because there sure are plenty of 'unnecessary' instances of those. The movie trundles along at a luxuriously leisurely pace, and while that is forgivable for a period drama, one does wish that Mr. Gowariker hadn't wasted so much time in the first half just trying to establish the proceedings. And the battle scenes. How do I put it? When I first heard about the lavish budget and use of CGI in the film I began to dare to hope that for once, Bollywood would turn out something revolutionary in the purely technical realm of live action. All that came crashing down the moment the Battle of Panipat came on. The sequence is a seriously ridiculous piece of trash, and I was almost in tears by the end of it. Thankfully, however, the quality of the battle scenes improves dramatically as the film moves on (thanks in no small part to the fact that all the subsequent battles aren't really full-fledged, all-out wars but more of small-scale, half-hearted negotiation-cum-conflicts). The final one-on-one fight between Akbar and his principle nemesis bears striking resemblance to the Brad Pitt-Eric Bana fight in Troy, and though it isn't quite as good as the Troy one, it is reasonably well done. The swordfight between Jodhaa and Akbar, however, scores over all the other fight sequences, and considering how much the cinematography and stunt direction of this movie were being talked up, that's a little sad.

The movie's dialogue is considerably difficult to understand, specially since the actors simply refuse to pronounce Urdu the way that it is supposed to be pronounced. And sorry, but there just aren't enough memorable lines for a movie of such epic proportions. The music by A.R. Rahman is fantastic as usual, particularly the Azeem-O-Shaan Shehenshah track, which, in one word, is awesome. As for the acting, I can confidently say that Hrithik Roshan has matured into a truly marvellous actor - he brings out every confused and passionate facet of an emperor with such incredible intensity that I repeatedly had to hit myself on the head for ever having doubted his capabilities as an actor. That said, however, I could never quite shake off the lingering feeling that Hrithik just didn't fit the role of Akbar. He looks - how do I put it? - far too - chiselled? and a little, um, puny, for a king. If you're laughing at me for calling the man with probably the best body in Bollywood 'puny', you ought to take a look at the size of the guy who plays his brother-in-law. Aishwarya Rai is perfectly cast as the headstrong woman-who-would-be-queen, and manages to look like an exquisite dream even when she's straining every nerve trying to make those sobs sound genuine (I have to say I admire her immensely for the effort she puts into acting). The rest are all sidekicks who get sidelined repeatedly during the course of the stuttering romance between these two, though it must be said that Sonu Sood does surprise you with a competent performance.

The cinematography, I'll make no bones about this, is disappointing. The imposing forts and the sets look grand, I'll agree, but I always felt like there was something missing, something that Gowariker forgot to add when taking all those sweeping shots of architectural marvels. There was no majesty in the art direction, no sense of awe-inspiring grandeur. The only times the movie looked anything close to a visual spectacle were when the camera focussed on Ms Rai. This, however, is a completely subjective opinion; I'm sure there are lots of people out there who were totally taken in by the sets and the photography. It's just that I wasn't. It's one of those things. And the movie's length! God, did no one on the sets of the movie remember to carry a watch? 3 hours 45 minutes is WAY too long for ANY kind of movie. One thing's for sure, this film is not going to win any awards for editing.

Gowariker'e last movie, Swades (which I personally loved), was widely criticized for being too much like a documentary and for lacking heart and entertainment value. I think that sort of criticism is much more appropriate for Jodhaa-Akbar. The movie has all the right intentions and the means to be going on with, but it simply fails to ignite the emotions of the viewer. It almost looks a little robotic - some of the lines and sequences, like the one where Akbar abolishes the jizyah tax, come off as downright mechanical. Not a major fault on the part of the director, by any means, but sometimes this sort of thing stops an ambitious and well-made project from becoming a great movie. Swades was a great movie. So was Asoka, if you're talking about historical epics. Not so Jodhaa-Akbar.

Bollywood 2007: Highlights

I know this is a little late, but here's the second of my 'best of the year' lists, which is about Bollywood. I guess I'll just have to abandon the third of my lists; my posts about tennis hardly get any readers anyway.

Movie of the year: A tight three-way contest between No Smoking, Taare Zameen Par and Jab We Met. After a lot of thought I’ve decided to go with No Smoking for its fantastically imaginative and original script that is treated with such immaculate flair by Anurag Kashyap. No Smoking has almost made me forgive Kashyap for his disparaging comments about Sanjay Bhansali’s Black. Almost.

Performance of the year: Kareena Kapoor’s exuberant turn as the rumbustious Geet in Jab We Met may not have been the greatest exhibition of acting, but it will be remembered for years to come for the sheer fullness of its spirit and naturalness of its expression. Jab We Met wasn’t so much a story of a chance meeting between two potential lovers as it was a celebration of the star that is Kareena Kapoor. And did Kareena enjoy the celebration!
Honorable mention: Darsheel Safary for his stunningly realistic portrayal of a dyslexic child in Taare Zameen Par.

Disappointment of the year: Om Shanti Om may have been the biggest blockbuster of the year, but it fell miles short of my expectations from Farah Khan, especially as it came after the super-enjoyable Main Hoon Na. Someone needs to tell Farah Khan that the spoof-cum-tribute thing is getting a little old now.

PR mastery of the year: Amitabh Bachchan made all the wrong moves career-wise, starring in duds ranging from the ridiculous Jhoom Barabar Jhoom to the pitiable Ram Gopal Verma Ki Aag, but he was mighty successful in one thing – teaching his son how to handle the media. Abhi-Ash was low-key and unglamorous, but not one joint public appearance by the couple failed to whip up a media frenzy. Clearly, the B Family’s got what it takes. I’ve finally figured out how Aishwarya Rai could ever have agreed to marry Abhishek Bachchan. Enough said.

‘Still got it’ star of the year: Shahrukh Khan defied his age and lack of versatility to come up with a couple of blockbusters and Anil Kapoor proved in Welcome that there’s no one who can quite do the loveable hooligan as well as him, but it is Madhuri Dixit who gets my vote for this award for simply being the Madhuri Dixit we’ve all grown to love. Five years after her last cinematic appearance in Devdas, Ms Dixit-Nene in Aaja Nachle is every bit as charming, as beautiful and as magical as she was in her heyday. Too bad her comeback movie itself was as silly as was Madhuri enthralling.

‘Serves you right’ act of the year: The legal team of Hitch suing, or attempting to sue the makers of Partner for plagiarism. It’s about time Bollywood puts a stop to its shameless and utterly disgraceful ripping off of Hollywood flicks.

Song of the year: As many as 3 songs from Taare Zameen Par could have come up trumps in this category - Aamir Khan sure does know a thing or two about songs and their place in a movie. Maa was unbelievably heart-rending and the title track was magnificent. But Mera Jahan had it all - great music, terrific lyrics and choreography that was almost too perfect to be true. Well, the movie was Aamir Khan's directorial debut; something had to be perfect.
Honourable mention: The Main Agar Kahoon track from Om Shanti Om for its wonderful, wonderful picturization, Tum Se Hi from Jab We Met for its beautiful construction coupled with its sweetly soothing tune and Phoonk De from No Smoking for, well, you'll never get it, so never mind.

Dance sequence of the year: Kareena Kapoor and Saroj Khan’s Yeh Ishq Hai number from Jab We Met. Most people might shudder in alarm at a Kareena Kapoor dance getting any sort of award in the year that Madhuri Dixit made a smashing dance-oriented comeback, but Ms Kapoor was something else in that song. She wasn’t dancing in front of the camera; she was having a whale of a time out there. So much so that some of her enthusiasm seemed to rub off on everyone else who appeared in the song. And I haven’t even started on the effortlessness of it all. *shakes head in awe*

Unintentionally hilarious movie of the year: Without a doubt the indescribable Cash. The only thing I want to know is: how on earth could Ajay Devgan have gone from the sensational Omkara to something as alarmingly inane as Cash? Incidentally, Cash would also be a strong candidate for the worst movie of the decade award, if ever someone decides to give such an award away.

Me Bored, So Me Write

I never thought I'd literally see a phrase written all over an event, but it was really hard to keep away the phrase 'too much of a good thing' from my mind while watching the 1st of 3 Test matches between India and Pakistan in Delhi. Honestly, the cricket throughout the match was so vapid and flavourless that it was startling. It didn't help, of course, that the current Pakistan team has about as much talent as a second string New Zealand team. The fizz has clearly fizzled out of Indo-Pak cricket and anyone who still insists that the cross-border rivalry is the definitive cricketing rivalry in the world needs to be rapped sharply on the head with a golfing iron or worse still, be forced to watch the movie Beowulf twice in a row. As a cricket fan, I'd like nothing better than the two countries to go back to their precious bickering and huffy cold shoulders (though only in the cricketing arena). Surely that would bring back the crackling intensity that once made Indo-Pak cricket so thoroughly mesmerizing? And for a short-term solution, how about giving Virender Sehwag a game or two?

Watched Bhool Bhulaiya over the weekend, and I must say, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. Akshay Kumar really has come into his own after all those long, tiring years of insipid roles and lame acting. The show-stealer, however, is undoubtedly the magnificent Vidya Balan who's possibly brought the most engaging charisma and endearing screen presence to the movies since the days of Madhuri Dixit. If only Bollywood was a little kinder to its less beautiful citizens....

Incidentally, if you're at all planning on extracting revenge from a particularly disagreeable adversary, you'd be well-advised to gift him tickets to the movie Beowulf. The poor guy won't know what hit him.

One Time Too Many

We know you like poking fun at Bollywood, Farah Khan, but it's getting a little old now. It all started, of course, with the hysterical Woh Ladki Hai Kahan number from Dil Chahta Hai. Main Hoon Na took Ms Khan's derring-do a step further; the subtlety and the sheer audacity of the humor carried it far beyond the most accomplished Hollywood spoofs in memory and, in my opinion, it can now be bracketed among the masterpieces of the decade. Yes, it's worked before, but that doesn't mean it will work every time. Om Shanti Om, Farah Khan's latest offering, is everything that a typical Diwali blockbuster ought to be, and yet it's remarkably unsatisfying, almost as though she had all the right intentions and cinematic techniques in mind but forgot somewhere during the making that she was making a full-length Bollywood movie, not an MTV gag show.

Om Shanti Om is as extravagant as they get - the huge sets, colourful songs and charismatic stars are all dutifully in place, as are the melodramatic lines and intentional over-acting. The plot is ludicrously fantastical - an unabashed mixture of Madhumati and Karz, if you will. Shahrukh Khan hams like there's no tomorrow, Kirron Kher weeps buckets as the quintessential tragic mother and there's also a disarmingly gorgeous newcomer in the form of Deepika Padukone to keep things electrified. In short, everything that made Main Hoon Na such a delightful charmer is recreated in this nearly 3-hour long saga. If only Om Shanti Om was half as entertaining as its predecessor. I'm sorry, but Farah Khan has some major explaining to do as to why exactly the first half is as boring as it is. The 70's may have been a fascinating time in the Bollywood studios, but Ms Khan's depiction of the same is decidedly not. Forget the tongue-in-cheek potshots at melodrama, lovers playing lousy tennis and garish costumes - if it doesn't keep you entertained, it's all a waste of time.

The second half is considerably better, and thankfully moves at a lively pace, but again you always get the nagging feeling that something's missing. The almost non-stop sprinkling of stars in funny cameos does manage to perk things up appreciably, but things go flat the moment the movie comes back to the central plot. For some reason, the movie decides to take itself more seriously as it approaches the climax, with expectedly disappointing results. A Madhumati-inspired culmination wasn't exactly the brightest idea, and the end credits, with every single crew member getting to dance absurdly for the cameras, is downright annoying. An overdose of MTV, perhaps?

The songs, for once, DON'T slow down the pace of the movie (surprise, surprise!), and that's mainly because all of the songs have a definite purpose and carry the story forward (with the exception of Deewangi Deewangi - but then again, weren't the "31 stars" the biggest attraction of the movie?). Moreover, the fact that Farah Khan is a choreographer par excellence is a major plus point too. Main Agar Kahoon has to be one of the best shot songs in recent times - one of Farah Khan's finest works ever. Dard-e-Disco is a bit of an eyesore, but the rest of the songs are fairly tolerable, and coming from a sworn song-hater (only in the middle of a movie) like me, that's gigantic praise. You've got at least one department of Bollywood filmmaking completely covered, Ms Khan.

Comparing a director's product with his earlier works isn't always the fairest thing to do. However, when the director decides to repeat or even refine his earlier methods, then comparisons are justified and more importantly, inevitable. And I can confidently say that Om Shanti Om's biggest drawback is that its director is the maker of a gem like Main Hoon Na. While Main Hoon Na was fresh in its appeal and made you laugh hysterically, Om Shanti Om looks repititive and only manages to make you chuckle, and that too sporadically. Again, while Main Hoon Na had a concrete, if laughably unrealistic script (as intended), Om Shanti Om suffers from jerky writing and an excess of needless subplots. And of course, someone needs to tell Ms Khan that the whole spoof-cum-tribute thing looked cute the first time; the second time it only comes off as stale and unimaginative. Please, Farah Khan, get down to some serious filmmaking next time; brand SRK can only save you so many times.

P.S. All of these disparaging comments about Om Shanti Om have stemmed mainly from the fact that I absolutely loved Main Hoon Na. If you haven't watched or worse still, absolutely hated Main Hoon Na, then the chances are that you might just thoroughly enjoy Om Shanti Om.

P.P.S. Deepika Padukone might just be the next big thing of Bollywood. If only she had a remotely pleasant voice to go with her stunning looks (and this is assuming that her voice wasn't dubbed for the movie).

P.P.P.S. Akshay Kumar is positively hilarious in his two-minute role. The movie might actually be worth watching just for his brilliant turn.

The Good Side Of Bollywood

I'd almost forgotten how it felt to watch a clean, wholesome and thoroughly entertaining Bollywood movie. Now don't roll your eyes at me as though I'm some Hollywood-crazy wannabe. Bollywood actually has been churning out some pretty insufferable stuff of late; you can't blame me for fawning over every new Hollywood release while only coldly condescending to declare to anyone who'd listen that I have no time for the melodramatic trash that is churned out by Indian filmmakers. But every situation has a saviour, as they say, and I can confidently say that I have found, if only accidentally, the perfect balm to my Bollywood-aversion - the deliciously charming Jab We Met.

To put it very simply, the movie is a top-class entertainer. If Socha Na Tha, director Imtiaz Ali's first venture was a refreshing take on the quintessential Bollywood love story, then Jab We Met is more of the same, only considerably funnier. The plot, admittedly, is nothing much to write home about - there can be only so many variations of the boy-and-girl-meet-on-a-train-and-decide-to-embark-on-a-life-changing-journey-together pitch. Ali's execution of the trite, formulaic story, however, seems something like the wave of a magic wand - all of a sudden the situations seem more realistic, the characters more likable and the journey more fascinating. The dialogues are witty, the visuals stunningly dreamy (just why haven't our filmmakers explored Manali to the fullest?) and the melodrama is kept to a bare minimum. Did someone talk about the definitive Bollywood romantic comedy?

There are many things wonderfully close to perfection about Jab We Met, but none as close as the casting. Kareena Kapoor was born for the role of Geet, the high-strung Punjabi who lives life in its most dangerous and intoxicating fullness, and every single scene in the movie screams this simple fact loud and clear. For someone as prone to over-acting as her, Kareena shows remarkable restraint and poise, and some credit for this must definitely go to Ali. This girl clearly has oodles of talent; why do so few directors make full use of it? As she sprints across the railway station, completely out of breath, screaming, "Besharam, apni wardi utar ke phek de", you know you're watching a potential legend. Shahid Kapoor, though overshadowed by the sheer charisma of his co-star, puts in a thoroughly accomplished performance. The music is melodious and the choreography of the songs is breath-taking; however, you can't help but notice that the songs do more harm than good: slowing down the pace of the movie is NOT a good idea. But I can forgive one blemish in a movie which is otherwise so thoroughly entertaining.

The movie has a certain subtlety to it that transcends the loud Geet and her louder family. It has no sermonizing and no unnecessary tears, yet the difference between living one's life impetuously and taking life too seriously is brought out with mesmerizing vividness. The movie has one of the most heart-warming separation lines in the history of Indian cinema and it can also boast, quite unusually for a movie of this genre, of a brilliantly taut climax. Is this the best Bollywood romantic comedy ever? Ah, looks like I'm going a little overboard now. Blame it on the excitability of human nature. Or on the incredible star appeal of a certain Kareena Kapoor. Don't sneer, watch the movie.

Birth Of An Industry

First up, I want to give out a disclaimer for all those who think there are too many movie reviews floating around blogosphere and the world in general: this is NOT a movie review of Ratatouille. This post is dedicated not just to one movie, but to the whole wonderful realm of animation. It's about time I did this too, considering just how much I love animated movies. So anyway, has anyone noticed that animated movies are no longer just a sporadic summer attraction that appeal exclusively to kids? Hollywood has been pumping in the big bucks into all things animated, and the creative minds of the world's biggest movie industry have, by and large, responded magnificently. The best part about this revolution of sorts is that moviegoers across the world have given their whole-hearted approval to the Hollywood bigwigs' inclinations towards expanding the genre which once had a very limited appeal into a full-fledged, multi-million industry.

Consider the facts: Shrek 2 is the 3rd highest grossing movie in the history of US cinema and the 8th highest grossing movie worldwide. Shrek The Third, despite the mostly poor reviews, came through most of the intense summer competition this year unscathed, and ended up making more money than Pirates 3, Transformers and, gasp! Harry Potter 5. The Lion King and Finding Nemo hold their own steady places on the all-time box-office list, while last year Happy Feet gave James Bond and Casino Royale a run for their stylish money. And get this: as many as 8 animated movies find a place on imdb's list of the Top 250 movies of all time. Clearly, the animation business is booming. Of course, there are many who've been protesting that there's been an overdose of animated movies the past couple of years, and I do admit that churning out Madagascar and The Wild, two movies with almost identical visuals and storylines, in very quick succession was a bit of a perfect personification of the word 'overkill'. But then again, animation is not just a genre any longer - it's an industry; it has its share of lean periods, as I'm sure does every other film industry in the world. And just when duds like Surf's Up and Barnyard were starting to give the naysayers solid justifications for their nay-sayings, out comes a little gem like Ratatouille.

Most critics have used horribly predictable words like 'sumptuous', 'feast', 'delicious' and a whole lot of other food-centric adjectives to describe Ratatouille, so I think I'll steer clear of those tasteless clichés. Ratatouille is not delicious, delectable or luscious; it's a marvellous example of high quality cinema that will, in the long run, prove to be the standard by which all other animated movies are judged. For once, imdb's users aren't wrong in their ratings - Ratatouille fully deserves its 8.5 rating and 77th rank in the Top 250 list of imdb. If not for anything else, the movie deserves credit for going beyond the genre-specific, or should I say industry-specific premises that have been so thoroughly exploited by other filmmakers. For instance, there's no faithful-but-dumb sidekick here. Nor are there too many pop culture references or crude, childish jokes. And considering the very mature handling of the story, it would've been truly embarrassing if Remy, the protagonist, had found a facile love interest at the end. The movie has an actual, identifiable storyline, which is very rare for an animated movie. And that's precisely where it scores handsomely.

There's something delightfully elegant and classy about the pacing of the story, the visuals, and of course, the fantastic dialogue. Maybe it's the French element in it, I don't know. Then there's the quality of the animation itself. I watched the movie with a friend who's doing engineering, and even though he was a little bored that "it wasn't outrageously hilarious", he couldn't stop raving about the precision and level of detail in the visuals. Of course, Pixar has set very high standards for animation with the ultra-realistic Cars and the beautiful The Incredibles, but that doesn't stop us from being amazed, every time, at how efficiently and perfectly the computer geeks do their job. The background score is indescribably fantastic, and since it is indescribable, I'm not going to attempt to describe it. The subplots are well-crafted, the actors chosen for the characters almost perfect. The ending is innovative and pleasant, and the monologue by Anton Ego (voiced by Peter O'Toole) at the end has to be one of the most beautiful and meaningful speeches I've ever heard in a movie. Frankly, I couldn't really find anything to complain about the movie, except perhaps that they could've made it a little funnier. But Ratatouille would've been a very good movie even if it didn't have a single gag in it. That, however, is not the case, which must make it obvious, really, that this is one movie that no one should possibly miss. Personally, I'd definitely rank this as the second best animated movie I've ever seen (I'm sorry, but nothing beats Shrek for me).

Now look what I've done - I've ended up writing a review of Ratatouille in spite of the bold (and pretentious, now that I think of it) disclaimer at the start. But honestly, I couldn't help it. I just had to write something in praise of such a heart-warming yet skillful attempt at movie-making. Oh well, I think I'll have to put in something now to make this sound less like a movie review. How about a Top-10 list of my favourite animated movies of all time? Yeah, it's cheesy, and it's unsophisticated, but what's life without a little cheese and a little unsophistication? Ok, I'm not even sure 'unsophistication' is a word, so I'll just get this over with without further ado. Here goes:
1. Shrek
2. Ratatouille
3. Shrek 2
4. Monsters, Inc.
5. The Incredibles
6. Ice Age
7. Flushed Away
8. Madagascar
9. Chicken Run
10. Shrek The Third

Cheesy Gets Fun

What is it with Steven Spielberg and aliens? Just about every significant movie about aliens, weird creatures or supersmart/monstrous/robotic freaks of nature in the past decade (and maybe even the decade before that) has had some connection with the legendary filmmaker. Which is not to say that he's always been brilliant at the gory extra-terrestrial dramas. War of the Worlds was a positively dull (and incomprehensible) CGI-reeking mess, while Men In Black had a tad too many gooey/slimy/disgusting creatures for my liking. The fact remains, however, that Spielberg loves extra-terrestrials. Which is why it is not surprising that the man has a firm connection with the big movie with even bigger aliens, Transformers, as its executive producer. Of course, Michael Bay is the captain of the ship here, and though it was totally expected of him to continue with his tried-and-tested formula of making thrill-a-minute entertainers with no depth whatsoever, I thought Spielberg's involvement would have made some difference here. Well, I was wrong - Transformers is as mindlessly entertaining and frivolous as Hollywood could ever get. And hey, I'm not exactly complaining. It's alright if filmmakers go for the Star Wars/Spider-man effect for their blockbusters at times; we don't expect a Batman Begins every single time. And even if we did, we wouldn't really be granted our wish, would we?

The visual effects in Transformers are, to say the very least, stunning. The level of detail and sophistication, together with the scale and magnitude of the cinematography makes 300 look amateurish in comparison. One just wishes, however, that they'd slowed down the camera in some of the fight sequences - it's almost impossible to keep up with the lightning pace of the transformations and stunts. On the flip side, the plot of the movie is about as ridiculous as Roger Federer losing to Guillermo Canas twice in a row. I don't know about you, but the whole 'allspark-code-grandpa glasses' angle almost made me burst out with laughter. But the thing that really had me in splits was the line "I AM MEGATRON!!!" - not exactly the first words you'd expect to hear from a robo-alien that has been defrosted after a hundred years. Nevertheless, the flick was great entertainment - the over-the-top theatrics (especially the unfathomable attachment that the lead characters feel for the far-from-lovable robots), the melodramatic humour and the ultra-cool Megatron (aside from his ludicrous opening line) bring more than a few smiles to your face. You almost want to forgive the childish dialogue and lack of depth in the plot and characterizations. Transformers is immensely likable, and is one of those rare movies that you can watch any number of times without getting bored. So three cheers to frivolous cinema!

A Week Before D-Day, and Things Have Turned A Little Sour

Here's an unusual question for Harry Potter fans: Is watching the latest Potter movie the best preparation for reading the newest Potter book? The guys up at Warner Bros must obviously have felt that the answer to that question is yes, a feeling that will most likely be vindicated by the bumper box office returns Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is bound to get. On the flip side, of course, Deathly Hallows is releasing on the 21st of this month, almost exactly one week after the opening of Phoenix, and heaven help Warner Bros if they think Potter fans are going to spare even a sideways glance for Harry's frustrating struggles with Dolores Umbridge when they could instead be grappling with monumental things like Snape being evil after all or horror of horrors, Harry himself going out with a painful death. But that's not the only problem the movie faces. I hate to admit this, but Phoenix suffers greatly from a tad too many over-creative liberties taken by the director David Yates, who perhaps needs to be told by someone that you just cannot fit an 800-page long book into a 2 hr 20 min short movie. Math, anyone?

The best that can be said about OOTP (Order of the Phoenix, for the uninformed) is that it is better than the first two Potter movies. The movie satisfies the hardcore Potter fans in managing to squeeze in nearly every important event from the book, but sadly, that very intent makes many of the scenes look rushed and fleeting. As for the changes from the book, well, let's just say that Yates should have had a serious chat with Alfonso Cuaron (the director of Prisoner of Azkaban) or even Peter Jackson, for that matter, about the do's and dont's of bringing new plot details in a hugely popular book before even thinking of directing the movie. Most of the changes in OOTP seem forced and unnecessary, and it only my fear of being labelled a raving/lunatic/obsessed Potter freak that's stopping me from listing all of those disagreeable changes here. Many sequences in the movie have an unfinished, anti-climactic feel about them (note the vapid end to the scene where Trelawney is sacked or the irritatingly docile reactions of Ron and Hermione to Umbridge's torture tactics). Sirius's death is butchered mercilessly, and Harry's outburst in Dumbledore's office, one of the most poignant episodes in the books, never comes to pass. Bellatrix Lestrange looks like a deranged medieval witch most of the times, and Grawp the Giant looks cute rather than scary. Ok, maybe I am sounding like a raving/lunatic/obsessed Potter freak after all, but who cares?

The special effects are fairly satisfactory, but the acting from the Trio is not. Alright, I'll leave out Rupert Grint from this - he's been consistently decent right from the first movie; but will someone please tell Daniel Radcliffe that he needs to put something on his face, like say, expressions? Emma Watson looks all pretty and charming (which Hermione is NOT supposed to be), but would definitely make things a lot more tolerable for everyone if she just stopped making her eyebrows continually dance like they're preparing for a ballet, or even if she refrained from delivering EVERY line looking like she's terribly out of breath. The older actors, on the other hand, put in very good performances, particularly Jason Isaacs, who as the pure evil/subservient Lucius Malfoy steals the show from everyone (including Gary Oldman in another appropriate Sirius Black turn). Imelda Staunton as Umbridge is almost perfect, specially with the 'Hem, hem' rendition and the revolting girlish wickedness, and there could not have been a better choice to play Luna Lovegood than Evanna Lynch. However, my biggest grouse with the Potter movies remains the shoddy portrayal of perhaps the third most important character in the books, Severus Snape. Alan Rickman may be a fine actor, but it is simply unacceptable that the makers have chosen to reduce Snape to a bumbling, comical idiot whose most significant moment is hitting Ron with a book. It's amazing how I seem to be the only one who finds fault with Snape's portrayal in the movies, but J K Rowling had always intended for Snape to be a no-nonsense, vicious, supremely smug persona, and the movie Snape is anything but that. I seriously cannot understand how they're going to undo all the damage they've done to Snape's character when he comes into its own in Book 6, the title of which, funnily enough, is named after him. In my book, Isaacs would have actually done a marvellous job as Snape, but will anyone listen to the true Potter fan?

The one thing that can be said about OOTP is that it hardly ever gets boring (ok, maybe the first half is a little boring, but you can't really blame Yates for that - nothing much happens in the first half of the book either). It would've been all perfectly good fun if it wasn't for the inescapable fact that it is an adaptation of a Harry Potter book, which naturally makes us pick at and frown at every minor detail which is inconsistent with the spirit of the book. It would also have helped greatly if they'd taken the trouble to explain everything about the plot adequately enough (my non-Potterized friends kept breaking out into perfectly understandable questions like, "what the hell is going on?"). And while we're talking about explaining things, I shudder to think how they're going to do that in Movie 6 with things as complex as Horcruxes flying around, specially if they're going to be hell-bent on sacrificing justice to the books for cash-generating ploys like keeping the length short. Alfonso Cuaron, where art thou?

Rain, Suspension of Disbelief and Monotony

So the rains have well and truly started in Pune. And, to borrow a quote from Fred Weasley (or George, can't remember which one of the twins said it), I haven't been properly dry since Monday. And just to set things straight, I am not still in the innocent, wondrous phase of adolescence when getting wet in the rain seems to be the most thrilling thing imaginable. Yes, I know, I should've used some common sense and stayed indoors or travelled by a bus, but strange beings that we humans are, I refused all thoughts of obeying the little sensible voice in my head and kept hopping around the city on my bike, getting ridiculously drenched all along. I guess my sense of reason, the one superpower that I like to attribute to myself, has seen better days.

Watched two movies this week (and got drenched on the way to the theatre on both occasions). Ocean's Thirteen is everything that Ocean's Twelve was not - it's witty, easy to understand and entertaining. I know many people didn't like the idea of the gang hatching their elaborate plan for revenge as opposed to personal gain, but somehow I could identify with the plot of Thirteen more than that of Twelve or even Eleven. Ocean's men seem more human and not quite the royally pompous, conniving, swaggering thugs that they were in the first two, and that's all for the good. And besides, any movie that has Al Pacino in it has to be watched at least once, if not for anything else then for his sheer extravagant presence alone. Andy Garcia finally comes into his own in the final instalment of the series, and though the movie misses the star power of Julia Roberts, it is a fine conclusion to a merry, ridiculously unbelievable tale of a bunch of crooks with big ambitions and even bigger resources.

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer is, like the first part, a perfect example of how to make a pure popcorn movie. The film's small length (it barely crosses the 90-minute mark), the likable stars (notwithstanding the fact that at times the movie seems, and annoyingly so, nothing more than a showcase of two of Hollywood's most good-looking actors, Jessica Alba and Chris Evans), the stunning visuals and the total lack of any complexities of plot all combine to make this one of the most enjoyable movies of the year, even if it is not the most thought-provoking one. And oh, that thing called 'suspension of disbelief' would come in really handy while watching this one (and while watching Ocean's Thirteen too, now that I think about it). Nevertheless, for once, a third instalment would actually be welcome.

Wimbledon begins tomorrow, and for the first time in 3 years tongues are wagging about Mr. I'd-like-to-see-anyone-try-to-beat-me-on-grass Roger Federer's ability to take home the most prestigious Slam of them all. Skipping the tournament in Halle, a tournament which he has owned for the past 4 years, may not have been ideal preparation, and after his latest attempt to make history at Roland Garros being thwarted in devastating fashion by Rafael Nadal he does seem to have lost a considerable amount of fire. But hey, he's not known as Mr. I'd-like-to-see-anyone-try-to-beat-me-on-grass for nothing. No one has won five Wimbledons in a row since Bjorn Borg, and if that doesn't bring back the fire in Federer's belly, I don't know what will, considering how little he has left to prove on grass. Justine Henin, meanwhile, is being talked up as the hot favourite among the women, and for some weird reason her victory over Serena Williams at the French has made most people comfortable enough to assume that the Williams sisters will not be major threats at the Championships this year. To these people all I've got to say is: Go fry yourselves. No one has performed as ferociously and as consistently as the Williams sisters on grass in this decade, and after Serena's victory at the Australian Open this year, I seriously can't understand why people like to write her off at every Grand Slam with so much imperiousness. And don't forget Maria Sharapova, Amelie Mauresmo or Jelena Jankovic either - boy, the women's draw seems incredibly competitive when compared with the men's draw. That's the Federer effect for you, French Open victory or no French Open victory. But maybe he'd like to be a little generous and give someone else a chance this year, yes? It's just that a little break in the monotony would suit everyone just fine.

Movies, Work, etc. etc.

Ahem. I never thought that the price of a professional job would be going blog-less for a month. And that's not the only handicap either; in fact, for some, that would actually rank among the least annoying of the miseries brought upon them by the headsore called work. Take, for instance, the fact that you are made to intermittently suffer positively awful spells of exhaustion, or that you are reduced to regularly having magnificently bland food disguised as lunch, or, the most painful misfortune of all - that you are forced to cut down on your sleep! So the real question at the end of the day is - is the money worth it? To be very truthful, no amount of money can ever be worth all that, but being truthful went out of fashion a century ago. So yes, the money's worth it. But it isn't really worth it. Okay, my rant is getting really incoherent now. I must move on to less muddled things.

Watched three movies in the last week. Cheeni Kum is surprisingly funny, it has no airy pretensions about it and succeeds at bringing out the innate humor in an unconventional love story. Amitabh Bachchan is in his element after a long time, and Paresh Rawal is dependably funny as always. But it is Tabu, that long-forgotten actress of sparkling caliber, who holds the film together with her wonderful naturalness. It's amazing how sometimes a simple role that doesn't require too many histrionics or intense emotions can make us appreciate the real quality of an actor. It happened with Kareena Kapoor in Omkara, with Rani Mukherjee in Bunty Aur Babli, with Akshaye Khanna in Dil Chahta Hai, and if I may dare to club him with Bollywood actors, with Al Pacino in the Godfather. I guess it's just one of the things that make movie-watching such a delightful experience.

Shrek The Third was probably my most anticipated movie of the year (well okay, my second most anticipated movie of the year - Harry Potter 5 grabs top spot without any kind of a fight). But the movie turned out just good - not outrageously funny, not amazingly pleasant, and not even completely devoid of boring moments. It would've been an exhilarating joy-ride if it weren't for the inescapable feeling of repetitiveness about the humour - there's only so many times you can roll on the floor with laughter at Eddie Murphy's Donkey jokes. And while I'm definitely not among those who hate Justin Timberlake with a passion, his Artie was downright uninteresting and even a little irritating. Mike Myers, Antonio Banderas and Cameron Diaz continue with their good work, but the whole film has a little staleness to it which not even the novel subplot involving the feelings of the perennially hated fairytale villains and the whole bit about how fairytale heroines can be anorexic party-loving bitches when away from the public glare can erase.

And that brings me to the movie that dwarfs all others in terms of scale, budget, length, box office returns and a whole lot of other things. The title of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is not the only thing that is excessively long about it. The official runtime of the movie is 2 hours and 48 minutes, and that beats most of Bollywood's overlong melodramas by a distance. Everything about the movie is enormous - the star cast, the budget (it reportedly cost a whopping 300 million dollars to make), the action sequences, even the supernatural goddess Calypso. Personally, I enjoyed every single second of the movie - I'm a die-hard Pirates fan, I've been one ever since Captain Jack Sparrow said, "But why is the rum gone?". It's infinitely better than Dead Man's Chest, and comes very close to being as good as The Curse of The Black Pearl, which is saying quite something. I'm sure plenty of people hated the movie heartily, and perhaps even more were left thoroughly confused by the many twists, turns and double-crossings in it, but that is wholly understandable for a trilogy that evokes as sharply divided reactions as does Pirates. The film actually looks as expensive as 300 million dollars, and is a grand epic in every sense of the term. The added bonus is, of course, that it is a very funny epic. Johnny Depp, Bill Nighy and Geoffrey Rush are, expectedly, the stand-out performers, but the support cast does well too. The CGI is ridiculously breathtaking and the fight sequences are going to end up as the defining cinematographic achievements of the decade. Admittedly, the pointless Calypso sub-plot, the frustrating complexity of the Dutchman curse and, of course, the somewhat tiring length of the movie do sour things a bit. But otherwise, it is a very worthy finale to a fantastic series and is quite easily the best movie of the year. Yet. Harry Potter 5, remember?

A Slow-Paced, Boring, Melodramatic Must-See

An alien symbiotic creature that clings to a piece of clothing, a man with a curious ability to conjure and resize his clothes entirely from sand but who wilts when exposed to water and a fully grown superhero weeping like a two-year-old when his girlfriend dumps him. 'Spiderman' was never about being realistic anyway. And with Spiderman 3, the improbability stakes go up just that bit higher. But who's complaining, when the stunning action scenes, breathtaking cinematography and lightning pace keep the audience obscenely entertained, right? The trouble is, Spiderman 3, for all its action-packed thrills and feeble attempts at philosophy, just cannot keep you glued to your seats - it is, quite simply, boring. And for a series as record-breaking and amusingly awe-inspiring as Spiderman, that's not good news at all.

The movie attempts to deconstruct the psychology of superheroes (now isn't that a Herculean task!) and underline the most basic doctrine of all - being bad is fun. The old guard of Tobey McGuire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco and Rosemary Harris reprise their roles as the central Spiderman characters in this mildly dark and very slow-paced affair. The movie starts off with Peter Parker (McGuire) and Mary Jane (Dunst) firmly ensconced in a compromising yet carefree romance, who spend their time together entangled in gigantic spider webs. Parker is still without a permanent job, but this time, MJ joins him on the list of the unemployed after being kicked out of a ridiculously dull stage performance the like of which I'm pretty sure will not find a single a viewer in the real world. The relationship begins showing signs of strain, what with Spiderman being such a hero and all and poor Miss MJ being reduced to working as a singing waitress. Things take a turn for the worse for the cranky couple with the appearance of the shockingly unimportant Gwen Stacy (Bryce Dallas Howard, utterly wasted) and her snotty boyfriend Eddie Brock (Topher Grace). For some reason, Spiderman thinks it a good idea to share a passionate kiss with Gwen in the presence of a shell-shocked MJ, which makes one wonder whether Spiderman is inherently evil after all, Venom or no Venom.

Meanwhile, Flint Marko (Thomas Haden Church), a predictably wronged convict on the run from the police, gets transformed into the invincible Sand Man under highly mysterious, not to mention amusing, circumstances. The script's excuse is that a 'particle physics' laboratory carries out highly dangerous, 'demolecularizing' experiments in frightfully unguarded pits, under the open skies, with not a hint of a worry about any thing or being falling into the pit accidentally and getting its molecules ripped apart. So Flint Marko, now Sand Man, comes to be a pretty invulnerable monster who is furious at the world for some reason, but who also has a human side to him, compassionately trying to rob every bank in sight to gather funds for treating his daughter's incurable illness (no idea what the illness is). All this while, the alien 'Venom' stealthily sizes up the emotionally ploughed Parker, waiting for the right moment to cling inseparably to the noble superhero and turn him into an arrogant, aggressive demon. And wait, there's another crucial subplot - Harry Osborn is finally ready to take up his due post as the new Green Goblin or the Hob Goblin (the name fans of the comic will assure you is the correct one) and avenge his father's death. A bout of amnesia for this one considerably eases things for poor Spidey, who has his hands quite full with not one but five different adversaries (MJ can be counted as an adversary too - she barely looks at him with anything other than pitying disdain during the movie). A case of too many villains? Fans of Spiderman the comic will wholeheartedly agree.

The film has plenty of moments to savour - the action scenes are brilliant as usual, and the fight sequence between Peter and Harry, (not the one between Spidey and Goblin) is fantastic, with the underlying simmering tension and deep-seated affection between the two spilling over quite dramatically. The episode where Spidey willingly gives up his sickeningly saccharine self in favor of the evil yet cool alter ego guided by Venom's venomous ways has been handled with wonderful deftness. You can actually feel Parker's enjoyment at being allowed to be bad, and McGuire, it has to be said, does a thoroughly efficient job in these parts. The character development is really shoddy though - there doesn't really seem to be any point to the Sand Man character, and Venom is quite unceremoniously dumped to the sidelines by all the romance and irritating sequences concerning the murder of Parker's uncle (turns out he was killed by Sand Man after all). Gwen Stacy is laughably insignificant - it seems the makers intended to give her a full-blown role at the beginning but forgot all about her somewhere in the middle. Nothing else can explain why they chose an actress as brilliant as Howard for the part, or why she accepted it.

The dialogues are predictably trite, but that's completely forgivable in a Spiderman flick. The acting is fairly average, though one wishes McGuire would tighten up his act in the emotional scenes - all he had to do was look at Dunst, who undoubtedly is the best performer in the movie, even if her character is horribly annoying. James Franco and Topher Grace do adequate jobs, and Rosemary Harris, thankfully, has very little to do in this one, because there's only so much of Aunt May reminiscing about her poor old husband and their lame times together that one can tolerate.

The romance is overbearing, the action too little, the pace too slow and the storyline too hackneyed and melodramatic. And yet, Spiderman 3 deserves to be watched at least once - the 'evil is fun' theme is far too irresistible, and the movie's box office returns are far too humongous to be ignored. There are many movies that are deserving contenders to qualify as the definitive movie of our generation, but none as strong as the Spiderman series. This is Hollywood at its costliest, loudest and most extravagant - let yourself be overawed by the hype, it's fun. Even if it is boring.

Erm, Time Travel is a Ridiculous Idea, Hollywood

Hollywood filmmakers really do know how to get on your nerves. They may use a lot of fancy special effects, get the most photogenic actors to prance around like saintly superheroes and dress up all of their movies with the snazziest of technology and production values, but at heart they're only really out to surprise, confuse and thoroughly irritate their unsuspecting audience. In the midst of all this, if the audience are lightly entertained for even a second, then it's a monumental victory for the average Hollywood moviemaker, and is taken as his cue to start work on a string of similarly logic-defying scripts, or better still, to make a sequel. Okay, that may sound a little insane, but at least it can explain the stream of movies based on time travel constantly coming out of Hollywood studios, and with all top drawer actors, no less. I just finished watching Deja Vu, a movie based on time travel, which stars Denzel Washington, of all people, as the main lead. And to be very honest, after two hours and six minutes of fairly entertaining, fast-paced thrills, I was only left wondering who on earth could have written such an outrageously ludicrous script, and why in God's good name Washington ever agreed to be a part of it.

The thing with time travel is that it is inherently such a ridiculous idea that when Hollywood scriptwriters take the concept and try to construct intricate plots replete with loads of sci-fi hogwash around it, they end up thrusting the most insanely unbelievable tripe at their audience. I know that sci-fi is supposed to be unbelievable, but most sci-fi movies do have a central logical theme to their plots that at least makes some sense with a degree of imaginative leeway on the part of us watchers. But time travel! It makes no sense whichever way you look at it.

Now I don't claim to have watched all of Hollywood's time travel movies, but I have watched a fair few - The Terminator movies, The Time Machine, Kate and Leopold, Deja Vu, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and The Butterfly Effect, the last of which was a surprisingly high quality product for a genre of such fatuousness. The Terminator series concentrated more on the robot/cyborg element, with time travel being just an auxiliary part of the plot, so I guess we can forgive the utterly crazy premise of humans and evil robots sending ultra-stylish marshals to the past to protect and destroy, respectively, the future leader of the human race. Kate and Leopold is a romantic comedy, and frankly speaking, is actually more believable than the slew of mindless, coincidence-abounding fairytales that are the norm for the genre, even with the 'crack in time' theory and Hugh Jackman playing the inventor of the elevator who somehow finds himself in the apartment of the remarkably unflustered Meg Ryan, who incidentally exists 120 years in the future. The Butterfly Effect, a completely fanciful venture that is mainly preoccupied with human emotions and fate, is darkly depressing yet unexpectedly stirring, and would certainly have had a very large cult following had Ashton Kutcher been a little decent at acting. It manges to get away because of the underlying supernatural theme, but only just.

It is when the filmmakers try to bring science into the equation that the plots fail spectacularly. In Deja Vu, for instance, Denzel Washington uses modified satellites to travel to the past and prevent a terrorist attack that he knows has killed hundreds of people. The trouble is, he also has to reverse the death of a beautiful young woman who conveniently yet bizarrely is crucial to the attack. And this, as you may very well have guessed, sparks off a series of confounding and fantastically ludicrous events that only the director can fully explain (though I'm not sure even he can). Apparently, the story moves through four different and discrete timelines, with Mr. Washington existing in two different forms in any given timeline, and each of these two forms is wholly oblivious to the existence of the other. At one point, we are even told that there is a 'dead' Washington who somehow managed to take along his mobile phone through the time machine even though he was strictly advised not to carry any extra baggage when making the leap, and an 'alive' Washington who notices, to highly amusing effect, that a victim of the attack (in other words, the dead Washington) receives calls at exactly the same time that he himself does. So in the la-la land of Deja Vu, mobile phones can travel through time too. If you think all of this is stunningly laughable, you should check out the 'theories' about the film at www.imdb.com. They'll leave you in very pleasant splits, I assure you.

I know this may sound a little biased, with me being such a big Harry Potter fan and all, but I honestly believe that J K Rowling's version of time travel is far saner than most other theories. In Potterworld, 'reality' cannot be changed no matter how much anyone may fiddle with 'time turners'. There can only ever be one timeline, and even if somebody does go back or forward in time, his or her actions will somehow be aligned with the existing reality as we know it, so that there can never be alternate universes or bringing of the dead back to life, thus eliminating at least two of the most worryingly unbelievable phenomena of time travel. In short, 'destiny' cannot be changed in Potterverse: Time is only a function of Fate, and no amount of time travel can bring any sort of disharmony to this fundamental truth. In spite of this rosy, intellectual-sounding explanation, however, the fact remains that the time travel part of the Harry Potter books and movies is still the most misunderstood and hotly debated Potter concept. Which just goes to show how terrifically inconceivable and needlessly confusing a concept time travel is: people are willing to accept flying on broomsticks and storing parts of one's soul in many different inanimate objects, but they refuse to accept time travel, even in as perfectly imaginary a work as Harry Potter. Something for Hollywood to think about?

A Real Laugh Riot

What do you do when you go out to watch a movie expecting it to be something of an epic cross between Gladiator and Troy, at least in terms of class, and instead get an apology of a movie that alternates between downright hilarious and painfully taxing? Curse the voters at www.imdb.com, that's what. I know the ratings system at the "earth's biggest movie database" can be a little quirky at times, but a rating of 8.2 for something as crass as 300, spearing it into the list of the top 250 movies of all time is pure scandalous. And the movie's making all the big bucks too - having scythed a rollicking opening in the US, it's on its way to becoming one of the most successful war movies ever. Seriously, Hollywood needs to be rescued, and fast.

The problem with 300 is not so much its actual quality but its over-ambitious intent. All the makers had to do was make a big budget, visually attractive movie that did NOT pretend to be anything more than a regulation comic book adaptation. Instead, they chose to aim for Lord of the Rings-style glory, which, predictably enough, makes it laughably over-dramatized. And don't even get me started on the liberal helpings of gore and violence, which, coupled with the noir-like brown tinge present throughout like some kind of sympathetic haze, gives you a right splitting headache. 

The film starts off dreadfully, with some kind of barbaric ritual meant to give superpowers to the privileged citizens of Sparta that only makes you fear for the sanity of the incredibly hot-headed Spartans. And things don't get better from there; in fact, they get progressively worse. The focus shifts to a blood-thirsty king who foolishly challenges the mighty Persian army to battle the specially-designed Spartan warriors. There's a queen too, who perpetually seems to be itching to deliver some powerful lines. Cut to a scene showing a savage bunch of morally-challenged priests and a very apoplectic Oracle-girl, and the king is advised not to go to battle. If only the king had heeded the good priests' advice, we would have been spared some really wasteful shots that are filled with nothing but blood and severed heads.

Instead, the king sets out to pulverize the almost-invincible Persian army with a puny band of 300 people, because he can't engage in full-scale battle. And here's where the real comedy starts. There are so many problems with this crazy suicide warring that it seems amazing that the legend of this ludicrously impossible episode has lasted so long. The 300 warriors, all of whose profession is apparently 'Hoo hoo hoo!' (at least, that's what it sounded like) go forth with no bodily armor, and indeed, practically no bodily clothes either. 

They then embark on a series of loud yells and excited pronouncements of the word 'Spartan!'. In fact, the words 'Sparta' and 'Spartan' are used so often in the movie that towards the end I was tempted to keep count. Everyone mentions one of these two words in nearly every line - the king continually insists that they should all die for Sparta, the warriors keep chanting that Sparta stands for freedom, and even the queen addresses her husband, not as 'my dear', 'my lord' or even by his name, but as, you guessed it, 'Spartan'. Clearly, the makers have a passionate obsession with all things Spartan.

The appearance of horrendously mutated and unpleasantly disfigured humans and all sorts of other creatures is something of a fashion in the movie. And some of the shots showing exactly how the 300 warriors enthusiastically butcher all of their adversaries, in very graphic terms, are too gruesome to describe. I still can't get one shot, where the king stabs the eye of a particularly nasty human-demon, out of my head - it was that grisly. Meanwhile, the king's ear-splitting yells and incessant spitting-in-the-face antics seem constantly in danger of driving his followers into raging madness. Instead, they get more violent by the minute, choosing to break into demented laughs every time they seem likely to be overrun. 

The Persian king Xerxes, looking very much like a vengeful bride and adorned with nearly ten kg of jewelery, makes some exuberant appearances too, and in fact, his sequences are among the funniest of the movie. Eventually, after an exasperating sub-plot involving the queen who is deceived with astonishing ease by a lecherous Councilor, the movie draws to a close, with the Spartans in exactly the same position that they were in at the start of the movie: on the verge of going to war with the Persians. Talk about a pointless plot.

The acting is bad, the dialogues embarrassingly childish, and the central idea of the importance of freedom is lost amidst the gallons of blood. The only area where the movie scores is the cinematography: the visuals are truly spectacular, and the graphic detail has to be seen to be believed, though that's one of the main reasons why it turns out to be so horrifyingly macabre. 300 is, quite simply, a disaster. But hey, if you can stand the gore and violence, you should definitely go for it: it will give you some really good laughs. And if you want to make your experience really memorable, watch it with around 10 of your friends; the comments will never stop. 

If only there wasn't the small matter of a hundred bucks being spent entirely on joking around with your friends; normally, joking around comes free.